Gardening is fantastic. I myself have a bit of a green thumb. If you are a gardener, I would hazard a guess that you like being outdoors and don’t have a problem with dirt. Maybe you like to go on walks or hikes? Have you considered marrying your two loves and trying wild plant foraging? This is one of those activities that seems daunting to start… especially in the city or someplace like Arizona that you feel doesn’t have a lot (trust me- I know). But, like any other activity, it is easy to start small and expand later if you do not overcomplicate it.
Today I want to go over 5 basic tools to get and how to take your first steps in foraging. Not comparing brands or getting into recipes… just the basics so you have a starting point.
5 BASIC TOOLS OF THE TRADE
Field Guide
I find Falcon Guides to be reliable & there are a LOT of them.
The first thing to buy is a LOCAL field guide. I want to stress this again… LOCAL. There are so many field guides out there and some are great for general reference but for ease AND for safety, it is best to get one that specifically focuses on your local flora. Many plants have look-a-likes that can be dangerous to ingest or handle and there are so many varieties of mushrooms, for example, that a general guide may not be specific enough to cover those found in your area. Additionally, if you are reading a local guide, it will help narrow down what you realistically looking for.
Gloves
This also seems fairly straight forward but you will want a high quality, good fitting pair of gloves. These will help you deal with prickers, stickers, and thorns, but additionally consider that some plants out there can cause skin irritation and even if you are not collecting said toxic plant, your target may be near it. I prefer to stick to lighter, breathable gloves for ease of movement but those do sometimes mean less protection from larger stickers or the cold from snow. Consider when and where you will be foraging and maybe go for something more heavy duty if you will be foraging in the winter or from some angry fruit bearing berry bushes.
A Knife/ Pruning Shears
This category can be big or little. Maybe you are a one knife person, or you like to have some variety and pack a couple. It is definitely a preference thing. I prefer to have a couple and use different tools for different jobs, but I also now live someplace where there is a LOT I can forage for a lot of different purposes. I have a couple favorites. The curved foraging knives that have a metal bristle brush on one end. The come as cheap or as expensive on Amazone as you want, fold for convenience, and the brush can be used to clean dirt off a harvested item. Hori Hori knives are my go-to as it can also double as a trowel, and some have notches for measuring as well. Garden pruning shears are also a huge help when foraging for twigs, branches, bark… you get the point. No matter what sharp, pointy objects you decide on, I would recommend investing in good quality ones earlier in your foraging career than later. They will hold an edge better and keep you from getting frustrated with blunt instruments.
Pruning Shears
Hori Hori Knife
Foraging Knife with Metal Brush
Shovel
Some plants you forage not for what is above the ground, but instead what is below. Tubers, roots, etc all require a bit of digging and using a shovel will save your poor hands even if you are wearing gloves. You are more than happy to lug around a full sized one but I find that folding shovel is more than enough for me in most cases and it is small enough to fit in me backpack.
Foraging/Collection Containers
There are sooooooo many options to choose from for containers to use for foraging and each site you visit will promote a different one. I am going to say that I like to have a variety on me even though it may take a while to build up a collection. Here is why though. Things that will be easily crushed need to go in something that will protect them; wicker baskets can work for this. Items that are maybe muddy or do best staying moist while you are collecting do best in something waxed or a plastic, 5-gallon bucket. If you are collecting mushrooms, I would promote using a mesh bag or something similar so that as you walk, the spores can fall out, spread, and more will regrow in that area. You can also consider smaller bags like ziploc’s, jars, backpacks, foraging aprons, etc. I sewed foraging cloaks (would call it an apron but it has a hood) but take along a couple jars, some plastic bags, a mesh bag for mushrooms, a couple glass vials, some newspaper for wrapping things separately, a Tupperware, my backpack, and a 5 gallon bucket (depending on the trip and season). This is because I collect a variety of items for different purposes and not all of them are edible and some are more fragile than others. I have even used my quiver for sticks instead of arrows since I wasn’t actively using it for archery.
TAKING YOUR FIRST STEPS
Once you have a few tools, here are the first steps I would advise in to get you started.
Find a local foraging group.
This really isn’t necessary but there are a couple reasons I would recommend it. First of all, knowledge is power, and the local foraging community will have tips and tricks about the local plants, where to go, things to look out for etc. Second, you may find a new friend to go foraging with and having someone with you if you are hiking in remote areas is not a bad idea. Having someone more experienced with you when you get started will give you a leg up and it often lessens the anxiety of a new experience if you know someone is there to catch what you may miss or correct a misidentified flower.
Decide on what you are looking for.
Start looking through your guide and decide on what you want to forage for. Are you looking for roots, mushrooms, berries? Maybe herbs for teas? Or maybe you are crafty and looking for natural dyes and bits for alternative arts. I usually look for berries, herbs, and mushrooms but will also press leaves and flowers and collect skulls, bones, feathers, dad insects etc for art and other things. Recently I have gotten interested in natural dyes and pretty much anything can be used for that if you like to experiment with colors and mordants. The point is… the trail is the limit. If you find it overwhelming, it may be easier at the beginning to start with 1 or 2 things you are actively looking for but don’t limit yourself.
Decide on where you will be foraging.
Think about where you want to forage and prepare accordingly. Safety first. If you are more interested in urban foraging (like in Seattle where you can pick berries that grow like weeds in even the most urban trails and parks), think about having reflective gear and the like but you can maybe pack a little lighter. If you are going on a mountain trail, prepare like you would for any other safe hike and consider heavier duty gloves, shoes etc. Mostly I just want you to be prepared and cognizant of where you are. On this note… please do not trespass. I know someone who literally breaks into an area or the train tracks that are blocked off because the mushrooms are everywhere and while the mushrooms are very delicious, I worry about the day that he either gets caught or injured.
Get your good-looking self, outside to forage, learn, and have fun!
Let’s go back to debunking the idea that bread is hard. It’s the end of February, which means everything is rainy and wet here- so I’ve been on a bit of a bread making kick. One thing I will always stay adamant about is that baking bread isn’t as hard as a lot of people now believe it is. So today I want to share a recipe for Ciabatta.
Once you understand the basic chemistry behind bread, it’s really quite easy. It’s a bit like a good relationship: If you pay attention to what you’re doing, you can’t really do it wrong. If you haven’t seen our Bread 101 post you can find it here– this will point you in the right direction for all the basics of bread.
Ciabatta is one of my favorite breads and ironically a type that a lot of people I talk to seem to think is more complicated to make. It’s not. In the recipe below I’ll give you two variations of it. One is a fresh style with no preferment if you’re short on time or not quite sure on sourdoughs (though I would strongly urge you to check out our post on sourdough, because again, it’s not as hard as it sounds). The other is a sourdough ciabatta because sourdough is king. Let’s get right to it.
Mis En Place (Get Your Shit, and Get it Together)
Fresh Dough Ciabatta
1 tsp instant yeast
240 grams of warm water (roughly 92 degrees), water should not be hot enough to hurt or it will kill your yeast.
300 grams All Purpose Flour, sifted
1 tsp of kosher salt
Sour Dough Ciabatta
1 Cup Active Starter
350 grams All Purpose Flour, sifted
225 g of warm water
1 tsp of kosher salt
Other Items Needed
Olive Oil, As Needed
Metal baking sheet
Parchment Paper
A spray bottle with water
Directions for Ciabatta
Fermenting
For the fresh method: combine water and yeast in the bowl of a stand mixer and let sit 5 minutes. For the sourdough method: add 1 cup of the flour to the starter in the bowl of a stand mixer and let sit for 5 minutes. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP FOR EITHER VARIATION.
Combine Flour and salt with yeast mixture and mix on low for 2-4 minutes to allow gluten to begin forming. Mixture will create a loose, VERY wet dough. Continue folding until no clumps of flour remain and wet dough is mostly smooth. (Dough is at roughly 80% hydration so don’t be alarmed that its loose- that’s intentional).
Rissing
Lightly grease a large bowl with olive oil and transfer ciabatta dough into it. Cover with a fitted lid (or plastic wrap) and let sit at room temperature for 1 hour. Remember the warmer the room is the faster the fermentation will happen (the quicker the rise).
Stretch and fold. We’re going to repeat this process 3 times. It will take about an hour and a half total. For each stretch and fold, get some oil or water on your hands to prevent sticking. I prefer olive oil, but water works just fine too. Do not use canola or vegetable oil as it messes with the flavor and will give the crust a funny texture.
With wet or greased hands, gently stretch and fold the dough every 30ish minutes by lifting carefully from each side and pulling the dough to the middle, one side at a time.
By the end of your stretches and folds the dough should have roughly doubled in size.
Shaping
Transfer to a floured surface. Dough with be sticky, but this is what we want. Using gentle fingers, tuck the ends and sides in until you have a loosely rectangular shape, being careful to not squeeze out air cells. Use a knife or bench scraper and cut the dough into two or four equal pieces.
4 will yield sandwich size loaves.
2 will yield larger traiditonal loaves.
Repeating the beginning part of step 5, shape each portion of dough gently into a rectangle and transfer to a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Very lightly, sprinkle top of each loaf with flour and cover with a tea towel. Then set aside and let rest 30-40 minutes.
Baking
Preheat oven to 420 degrees. Fill a large baking dish with water and place it in the bottom of your oven (bottom rack). Close the oven and let it fill with steam while it preheats.
When the oven is preheated and the dough ready to go in, slide the sheet tray directly in the oven and spray with water immediately. Close oven and set a timer for twenty minutes.
Check for doneness (bottom of loaf will sound hollow when tapped with a knuckle).
Remove ciabatta from oven, transfer to a cooling rack, and let cool 90% of the way before giving in to temptation and slicing. DO NOT SKIP THE COOLING STEP. YOUR GLUTEN AND AIR CELLS NEED TO SET. I know it’s hard, but you did not spend hours baking bread to ruin it at the last moment.
Happy Friday! With bridal season starting back up, and us working on a few events for this year, sustainable event planning has been on the forefront of our mind lately. Event hosting (especially weddings) can be a big source of waste if we’re not mindful. In many cases, things are purchased, used once, and discarded. Its never sat well with us, and that’s part of the idea behind the kind of events that RavenWerks wants to host. Today we want to share ways to help you plan a more sustainable wedding.
The Green Bride Guide states that the average wedding produces 400 lbs of garbage and 63 tons of CO2. With an estimated 2.5 million weddings per year, that is about 1 billion lbs of trash and as many emissions as approximately 4 people would produce in a year, in just one single day (link).
This can mean a lot of things. You could go the route of renting, which means it doesn’t end up in a landfill, and you don’t have to store it afterwards. There are a lot of different services out there that provide linens and specialty dishware as well as other things.
If you have a very niche theme, this can seem more intimidating, but don’t let that deter you. You can do a lot if you’re creative enough. If you’re a Washington local you can also reach out to us, that’s kind of what we do. We love to help create custom events for alternative décor styles and take the stress off of you. You can learn more about that process (here).
Create Legacy Pieces
Another idea in this area is to choose décor that you can reuse in your home later. As an example, I planned on reusing all the frames we made for my wedding to display our wedding photos in our home. It worked out really well, and I now have a really unique collage full of memorabilia. We turned the silk flowers we used for part of our decor into a chandelier in our dining room. My gnomes are now in my garden, and my D&D dice are, well, my D&D dice. A more sustainable wedding doesn’t have to mean that you skip out on creating an intentional experience.
gnomes hidden around the venue
floral chandeliers
D&D Dice
Upcycled Frame Decor
Donating Decor
You can also donate your wedding décor if it’s something that isn’t name specific. Thrift stores are always an option. But a lot of wedding planning companies also take donations to help them build their inventory of what they can offer to others. You just need to find a planner/ rental company that matches your style of décor. If you have décor that matches their style you can support a small business and keep things out of landfills. If you’d like to donate, you can reach out to us at info@ravenwerksguild.com.
Hire Sustainable vendors
Your vendors and the people helping you on wedding day are a huge factor in how much waste is produced. Talk to your vendors as you book about what their practices are like (I know, it’s one more thing to consider, but it’s worth it). Some states and areas even have vendor groups of companies that are vetted. Zola and the Knot have a filter you can use if you are using a service. If you’re a Washingtonian, check out Emerald Hour Wedding Society, they offer amazing information.
In some ways, the easiest thing you can do to plan a more sustainable wedding is hire vendors that have practices in place, as that is where the bulk of wedding waste is.
Let your Bridesmaids/ Groomsmen Thrift their Attire
This can be harder to do for groomsmen depending on your style. However, where possible I highly recommend it. Another back up is to rent it, especially if you’re going more formal. This is one of the simplest things you can do on this list.
The days of mandatory matching dresses are over. Many modern weddings opt to have bridesmaids all wear different dresses in the same color or color palette. With the way the fast fashion industry contributes to ladfills and carbon emissions, I strongly urge brides to let their bridesmaid’s thrift or buy consignment for their gowns. Being a bridesmaid can be expensive and that can be hard for friends; even if your best friend wants to help on your big day. Allowing your friends to thrift their clothing can also make things less stressful for them. It can also make for a fun wedding activity to do together.
This helps merge a more sustainable wedding with a touch of individuality. AND it ensures that each of your bridesmaids will get to wear something that they feel comfortable and good about themselves in. Very few things are worse than being forced into clothing that makes you feel exposed or bad about yourself for hours on end in front of lots of people. Especially when you KNOW pictures are going to be taken that will probably be on someones wall for all time.
Shop Consignment for Your Wedding Gown.
Don’t freak. I know that for some people and cultural groups there are superstitions around this (mine included because I had to have this conversation with my mom). But consider for a moment the environmental fallout from how many wedding dresses are thrown away every year. It’s momunmental the number of dresses that are purchased to be worn once and never put on again. There are also the millions of dresses that never get purchased, and get discarded.
Mikaela and Taylor out front of Astraea Bridal where she Bought her Dress.
Consignment is not what many people think it is. Many consignment boutiques do carry local consignment (dresses that have been worn by brides and then consigned). These dresses are vetted thoroughly for condition, style, and quality. Additionally, most consignment boutiques mostly carry over stock and discontinued sample dresses. Meaning they are typically only a year old and have never been in an actual wedding, just a show room floor.
This is not only a way for you to help keep something out of a landfill, and support a small business, but also save money planning your wedding. Most consignment bridal shops are selling 20-40% off original retail. You can always tweak your dress in alterations and then you still get the option of keeping your dress after, or consigning it back if you want to recoupe some money.
In Washington, we love Astraea Bridal in Mt Vernon (we’re biased, that’s where I bought my dress and sometimes help out at). Laura, Leslie, and Megan really know what their doing and create an amazing personalized experiences that really make you feel comfortable and safe. We’ve also heard great things about Brides for a Cause in Seattle, if you’re more in that area.
Consider your paper waste
Is all the paper necessary? Do you need a program, and place holders, and a pamphlet about the bridal party? Pare down what isn’t applicable to you. It’s always been weird to us that in a world where we understand that we use far too much paper, we still hold on to certain wasteful practices in the name of tradition. Companies like Zola and the Knot also allow you to have people RSVP online. This not only saves you from having to manually count and keep track of your answers, it also eliminates RSVP cards.
What stationery you do need, go for natural fibers and recyclable material. Or consider compostable materials and seed papers. They are still high quality, and heavier weight papers, but without as negative of an impact to the environment. Planning a sustainable wedding doesn’t have to mean that you use NO paper, just be smart about what you choose.
Transportation and Venue
A seemingly smaller thing to consider is cutting down your guest list if possible. This reduces your costs, but also the per capita waste on every single thing in your wedding. Less food, less party favors, less paper products etc.
Another thing is to have your ceremony and reception in the same place if you’re not getting married in a church or religious building. This cuts down on carbon emissions from having to shuffle everyone around (and saves you from having to organize transportation as an added bonus).
Tackle Your Registry with Intentionality
While some very established couples choose to forgo a registry altogether, being environmentally conscious and choosing to plan a more sustainable wedding, doesn’t mean you have to. There a number of things you can do to make this more eco-forward.
Look into a company like Everlastly. This company offers more traditional wedding registry items for couples that still need the more traditional things. However, they are sustainably made, transparently rated, and vetted through a process designed to promote honesty from vendors. We love them.
You should also consider what you need and what you don’t, and talk to your guests. We know that talking to people about asking for gifts is an uncomfortable topic for a lot of people, we totally get it. But it doesn’t have to be if done with authenticity.
A lot of people will just buy something from the traditional wedding gift list if they aren’t sure what to do. When putting your registry together consider things in your life that you really want or need. Many online registries will allow you to open group gifts so people can contribute to something bigger that you may need instead of a butter dish that you only pull out once when they’re over.
Consider what your goals are as a couple.
If you both decide you don’t really need anything, be transparent with your guests about that. “We don’t really need more stuff, your presence is all we need. However if you really want to contribute to the start of our next step ________blank is really important to us and we’re saving for __________.” Maybe you’re both working to pay off student loans, or purchase a home. Maybe you haven’t taken a trip in forever and you’d really love to take a special trip. Letting guests that want to give you something for your wedding, contribute to something bigger that is important to the two of you is a perfectly acceptable thing to do.
Consider your Flowers
Local Floral Display By Floravore
There are two different approaches to this. One is to go the Wooden flowers route then you have a unique way to keep and preserve your flowers. If you’re like me and still just want the simplicity of natural flowers, the other option is to make sure that you are picking local, in season florals. This is better for the natural grow cycle, supports local business, and cuts down on CO2 emissions as the travel for transport of imported flowers is eliminated. This in part comes back to your vendors. Have a conversation with your florist about where they get their product from and who their suppliers are.
If you go the second route, then they are either compostable, organic material, which goes right back to mother earth or you can have them dried or preserved if you’re more of a memorabilia person.
Dinner Ware
Depending on your style, this might have a bit of overlap with “vendors”, however, it bears mentioning.
If you are having a more formal get together, consider renting dishes or see if your venue will provide them. We’ve seen a few people do the thrifted unique dishes as well which is really quirky depending on your theme, and what your plan for them afterwards is.
If you’re having an outside wedding, or something a bit more laid back (but still nice and put together), opt for compostable dishes over regular disposable paper or plastic. Many paper plates aren’t compostable or recyclable because of the coating on them. Plastic ware finds itself in the same boat. Compostables have come a long way and there are a number of different styles and types available that range from uber casual to natural or more polished looking. You can even buy them on amazon if you aren’t sure where to start.
Consider your Wedding Favors
Tea Party Favors by RavenWerks Guild
Many couples are choosing to forgo this part of a wedding altogether, and we’re totally here for simplifying and minimizing the consumer behemoth that has become commercialized weddings.
However, my inner Hobbit’s need for elevated hospitality completely understands the decision to cut a different part of the wedding in favor thanking my guests. At the same time, it’s silly to waste your money on something that honestly nobody needs, will cost you money, and end up in a landfill (we’re talking to you overpriced bride and groom wineglass. We don’t really need dinnerware with someone else’s name on it).
There are some really unique and environmentally friendly ways to express gratitude to your guests for coming. Put your heads together for something inexpensive that is reflective of you, and the authenticity will make it mean more to your guests as well. If it’s handmade or edible- even better.
A Few Favorites We’ve Seen
Miniature loose leaf local teas with honey sticks
Reuseable aromatherapy heat packs
Little wooden Ornaments
Custom Cookies
Hand rolled candles.
A print of the bride and grooms favorite picture with each of the guests (these we’re printed at Walgreens with a little note. We’ve also seen a variation of this done as a cool thank you note- the bride and groom’s favorite picture from their wedding with each guest for their thank you cards).
Chocolate truffles
Homemade preserves
Tiny soaps
Little succulents
Sample jars of honey
Sample bags of coffee
Homemade bird seed ornaments
Little air plants
Pet rocks (this sounds bizarre but it was weirdly adorable and people were tickled)
If you’re doing a formal send off or goodbye, there are a couple versions we wish people would skip for various reasons. Please don’t use rice. Despite being biodegradable, birds eat it and it’s really terrible for them, it can even kill them. Skip the glitter and plastic confetti. Quite frankly, glitter is an abomination and people shouldn’t use it for anything. A quick google search will reveal the tip of the iceberg where the hazards of microplastics are concerned, but the far reaching consequences of them goes even deeper.
Try opting instead for dried flowers like lavender, or jasmine. Paper confetti is also an option if you get a compostable or non-acidic type. We’ve seen bird seed used and we also knew a couple that had a wedding in the fall and hole punched dried leaves for confetti, which was really unique.
In Our Opinion
Weddings should be intentional, personal, and unique. While yes, you are hosting an event you are also celebrating a major life-decision, step, and life long commitment. You are celebrating your relationship with your best friend and partner. There are so many possibilities and ways to make things unique even on a budget. As passionate about that as we are, we truly don’t believe that doing that requires us to sacrifice on our ethics, or the environment.
These are our favorite ways to incorporate sustainability into planning a beautiful wedding (that will hopefully take some of the strain off your pocketbook as well). This list is by no means comprehensive, and we’d love to hear your ideas as well. You never know who else you could help (and of course the planet). We’re constantly striving to improve our services and the way we do business. Collaboration and education is a big part of that. Let us know if there is something else people can do to lessen the environmental impact that hosting a wedding can have.
A bigger lie was never told to the American population than how they should and shouldn’t eat. Yes, I know- this is coming from someone who claims to love food science. And I do. It is precisely that reason that the American Food Chain System frustrates me so much. Today I want to talk about having a healthier food lifestyle.
There is so much misinformation out there about what ingredients are good, which are bad, what will help you shed weight quickly, what will balance your gut bacteria, etc. that its easy to get lost in the ‘data’ if you’re not paying attention and you’re not an informed consumer.
This misinformation changes so constantly that it shouldn’t be surprising how many people have little to no idea what they’re putting in their bodies. It is politisized, capitalized, and propaganda’ed to death. Which leads to swaths of people with eating disorders, malnutrition problems, and a great many other issues. Today we’re going to cut through all the red tape. This is a political, propaganda free space. Below is a list of 7 things that I use as pillars in my dietary choices to have a healthier food lifestyle.
Disclaimer
This is one of those topics that I can end up on a soap box about and by the end of the soap box people are reminding me to breathe when I talk. You’ve heard me talk a bit about this in our post on Kitchen Sustainability and Nutritional Paradigms and I’m excited to dive deeper. I get passionate about a number of food topics and this one is right up there with people cutting any form of filled doughnut in half. I could spend hours, days and even weeks talking about all the different levels and complexities of the American food system. In fact, I plan too. That’s kind of the whole point. But today, at least, I wanted to give you a brief overview of my overall stance on food, so that as we build on topics, you know where I’m coming from.
You don’t have to agree with me, in fact, I’m hoping some of you won’t because I love discussions. Much of what I currently believe has come from discussions with other people in conjunction with my own experiences and learning- my views are much different than they were when I was younger. All I ask, is that you come in with an open mind. Afterall, these are my opinions and experiences, and I’m sure my experiences will differ somewhat from yours.
I’m Not a Doctor- What I am sharing is My Opinion Based on My Experience and Education
The easiest thing to do is tell you what I believe, and why. From there we can build on and discuss different areas in depth in the coming months. As I have said previously, I am not a doctor– and for any topic specific, truly in-depth medical advice, I would urge you to talk to a doctor and nutritionist/ dietician (I did). But I believe we are smarter as a community when there is collaboration and I see no harm in sharing baselines and guidelines.
At my core, my food beliefs are simple and few, and I will try to pass it on that way as I think most things in life are easiest to adopt when kept simple. I think most people would have a better overall quality of life if they had a healthier food lifestyle. And we’re all about quality of life here.
A Healthier Food Lifestyle Means Everything in moderation
This applies to all my other opinions/ beliefs on this list as well. Heck, it’s solid life advice. Even when you make a less than perfect choice, its not a huge deal if you do not overindulge. It removes much of the pressure, and I never want someone to feel pressure or stress when eating. Also, you can have too much of even the ‘healthy’ things, which makes them not so healthy. In everything- moderation is key. So many times its not a matter of good food vs bad food but too much or too little. A healthier food lifestyle is about balance!
There Are No Bad Foods In A Healthier Food Lifestyle
This is a more complex concept and people tend to balk at this. There are things that are less healthy, there are things you should reach for first. There are things I try to minimize in my life or avoid 99% of the time. A healthier food lifestyle cannot exist in an environment where we are vilifying foods and food parts.
Food is fuel. Carbs are not bad. Fat is not bad. Chocolate is not bad. Gluten is not bad. Sugar is not bad. Things in EXCESS are bad. Is there a right way to eat carbs/gluten/sugar/fat etc.? You betcha. Are there specific individuals who due to allergies/medical conditions/ etc. need to avoid certain things? Yes, myself included. But that does not rule those categories out for everyone. Blanket bans on foods are a red flag for me. When we get into marketing, food psychology, and fad diets- you’ll see what I mean.
Erase the Word Diet From Your Vocabulary
Diets suck. I do not believe in diets. The phrase ‘I’m on a diet’ or ‘I’m watching my diet’ implies temporary. It implies restriction. It usually comes with a groan, an eyeroll, or a wave of sadness over pastries left un-eaten. “Diet” is a noun, not a verb. The second you tell yourself you ‘can’t have’ something- you want it three times more.
People quit diets; and the second you stop your ‘diet’ things go back to the way they were- weight, sleep, energy levels, brain function, sex drive, etc. I don’t do diets. I believe in lifestyles, intentionality, and eating things I love. Having a healthier food lifestyle starts with consistency. And consistency requires it to be something sustainable.
There are No Shortcuts to A Healthier Food Lifestyle
This is a hill I will die on. No matter how many times I get my hopes up, time has taught me- if you want it sustainable, healthy, balanced, and attainable- there are no shortcuts. There is no magic food to make you drop pounds quickly. Quick fixes don’t exist. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is, and you should run for the hills. It took time to make you the way you are today and it will take time to make you into anything else, whatever that may be.
No Two People’s Diets Are the Same, Nor Should They Be
No two people are the same, so why do we have a one size fits all approach to food historically? This is where I say- talk to an expert. Learn what’s right for YOU. And WHY those choices are right for you. When you know WHY you’re doing what you’re doing- it’s a lot easier to do. I personally also believe this would eliminate 60% of fad diet crazes.
Ever heard “My cousin _______ has been doing keto and she lost like 50 pounds, maybe you should try that.” Or my personal favorite “you really should go gluten free, it would help with ______” 2000 years of mankind eating bread as a staple of our diet and all of a sudden EVERYBODY thinks gluten is satan’s favorite food. The gluten isn’t the problem, but we’ll get to that. Are some people gluten intolerant? Absolutely, but not everybody is. See where I’m going with this? A Healthier food lifestyle requires acknowledging your body as a unique individual, learning what those uniques individual needs are, and listening to them.
Whole Foods
Taking into consideration “everything in moderation” and “There are no bad foods”, I still reach for whole foods as often as I can because those are the best options for me. This is the difference between Food and Edible Food Products. Bell pepper= food. Oreos= Edible Food Product. I still pick up Oreo’s from time to time, but I try to go 90/10 in favor of foods that are exactly the way nature made them. Whole grain vs white bread, macaroni from scratch vs the kraft box.
My rule of thumb is: If I can’t say it- don’t eat it. If I don’t know what it is- don’t eat it. It’s not as hard as it sounds. I would rather you take pleasure from time to time in a homemade cheesecake or the extra queso you made from scratch to go with your burrito bowl than eat the box of hamburger helper or the prepackaged ‘dietary’ TV dinner (yes, I mean even the ‘healthy’ ones.).
So many people think they already have a healthier food lifestyle because they’re picking up the SmartOne instead of the Kraft Mac n Cheese. But the truth is- if you read the ingredients tab, they’re still loaded with things that aren’t meant to be in your body; they’re just low calorie or carb balanced (we’ll get to food marketing later because that’s a whole different animal).
Remember to Not Food Shame
Edible food products aren’t evil and can be enjoyed, I’m a terrible sucker for Girl Scout Cookies, They are in season and I have a couple boxes of Thin Mints in the freezer and several boxes of Samoa’s, Do-si-Do’s and Tagalongs hidden in the closet where my husband can’t get to them and eat them first. The point is everything in Moderation!
Meat is Not Bad
Yes, I know that this kiiiiind of fits in with “no food is bad”. And Yes, I know I just lost some of you. BUT it’s a big enough food schism that I think it warrants its own bullet point. I’d also like to remind you that I asked for open mindedness and that these are MY beliefs. They don’t have to be yours. If you are vegetarian or vegan- I do hope you keep reading. Not only because there are still other things in this section of our blog that are of value and will still be relevant to you but also because I think these kinds of discussions are important to working on that visceral schism.
I do not have a problem inherently with vegetarianism or veganism- though again, I believe there is a right and a wrong way to do both. However, I’m never going to be offended or bothered if someone chooses to not eat meat. If eating animals or animal bi-products bothers you emotionally or morally, I can accept and respect that so long as you afford me the same courtesy.
So here’s my stance on meat vs no meat in a healthier lifestyle:
Scientifically, we as humankind are omnivores. That means you are biologically designed to eat meat AND plants. It’s why you have front sharp teeth for the tearing of meat and flat back molars for grinding and chewing plant matter. Kind of like bears or wolves. That’s why you have one stomach and the intestinal structure you do instead of a crop like a bird or 4 stomachs like a ruminate. Plant protein is physically different than animal protein, and you are genetically designed to need BOTH. I personally do not believe in arguing with the natural order of things, mother nature knows best. I also happen to like how most meat tastes.
However, I’m picky about the meat I eat. Having a healthier food lifestyle means being a responsible consumer. I’m picky about where it comes from, how the animal is raised, its quality of life while alive. I’m picky about giving thanks, and making sure to call a spade a spade. If you’re going to eat pork, acknowledge it was a pig.
Additionally, I believe in moderating meat consumption- If China alone ate the amount of meat that the U.S. does- we would need 2.5 planets just to grow the amount of corn needed to feed the cows (see also, I don’t think cows should be fed corn products in feed lots, I only buy grass fed) that’s insane. We do not need nearly as much meat as modern society has trained you to consume. The rest of the world does not consume meat at nearly the same rate that we do.
In Conclusion for My Love of Food and a Healthier Food Lifestyle
Obviously, I’m very opinionated when it comes to food. I tried to pare down my biggest beliefs in their most generic and simple ways, knowing that we have all the time in the world to peel back layers and explore specific topics. I’m very excited to get to share nutritional tidbits, debunk theories, share recipes, discuss, dive deep, and learn more with you.
If you have a passion for food like I do- I would offer one parting piece of advice. Check out the Master Class by Michael Pollan. He presents a very straight forward and impartial view of several food topics and really stretched my critical thinking muscles and challenged some of my thoughts in a fresh and respectful way. He also articulates much better than I can and said something in that class that basically covers it all in the simplest of terms better than I ever could. I’ve been keeping it in my pocket as my easy to remember sentence for talking to people but also to help me make decisions about my food throughout the day: Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly Plants.
Today we’re going to combine two of my favorite things: Crafting and Herbology. In light of the Imbolc Holiday I thought it would be a good time to teach you how to make Sleep Sachets. The beauty of this project is that it’s something you can easily do in the comfort of your own home. There is something therapeutic and old-worldy about working with herbs. It’s calming and I find it helps clear my mind.
Herbology and Kitchen Witchery are one of the oldest forms of science in the world. Cultures and nations from all regions have their own herbal remedies and beliefs. Frequently lumped in with “Grandma’s Kitchen wisdom”; they are cures and concoctions that are frequently undervalued.
While modern science may have evolved past herbology in many cases, there is still much that can be done with well-placed plants. Many common ailments and issues find simple clean solutions in the kitchen that can keep you out of a doctor’s office and feeling your best. And they are easy. I promise you- it’s not complicated. Don’t let anybody make you think it’s rocket science, because its not. As you get farther into your study of plants you will discover that not only are there lots of things you can do with plants, but there are also lots of things you can say with plants.
Getting into herbology was one of the easiest things I have ever done. I was already constantly in the kitchen and loved the ‘slow food’ & ‘clean cooking’ concepts. Then I went through this period of finding out as much as I could about specific diets for certain conditions and illnesses after I got diagnosed with lupus. Educating people about their food is a strong passion of mine. Combine that with a sister that has the BIGGEST green thumb in the world- and it just seemed like a natural conclusion. But I digress…
Sleep Sachets for Dream Weaving
Some people will tell you that there is no credence behind dreams and their meanings. However, I have had just a few too many personal experiences with dream journeys to not listen when the universe is trying to tell me something.
Come on, we’ve all had those dreams where we woke up feeling like we witnessed something. Like something was trying to show you a path or point you in the right direction and you wake up going ‘huh?’ and reaching for your dream interpretation book. Then again, some dreams need no translation because you wake up saying ‘message received, loud and clear’. I’ve even had periods in my life where I dreamed in consecutive episodes and each night I got a little further into the story. I know Taylor has had similar experiences. It will be exciting in the future to get into dream interpretation with you all, but that is a project for a different day.
History of Sleep Sachets
Sleep Sachets have been common in some cultures and beliefs since the 16th century. they were used widely throughout Europe for a variety of purposes. The aromas and energies of certain plants can help induce and maintain deep sleep, lucid dreaming, and even help relax the mind. If you’re one of those people that struggles to let go of the day’s tension to even drift off- then this is for you.
Sleep sachets are a good stepping stone because they can be both generic, and then easily built upon to personalize their influence once you know the basics. The practice is simple: Create your sachet and then sleep with it under your pillow or in your pillowcase. You can always buy sleep sachets online from places like Etsy. However, sleep is a personal experience and as such; is one of those things that I prefer to make myself. To me, setting the intentions is the most important part.
Most of the common ingredients are things that most people keep stocked in their spice cupboard. If not, many are readily available online. If you like the personal touch like me or knowing where the plants came from- there are a few of my favorite herb shops listed below as well. This is by no means a comprehensive list- especially since in a lot of ways, Dream work, and herbology is open to some level of interpretation.
Probably the queen of all sleep herbs, definitely the most soothing in most kitchen witch gardens. It may seem stereotypical since its modern resurgence, but there is both cultural truth and scientific truth to that. Lavender can calm anxiety, invite deep restful sleep, and ease tension and headaches. Lavender has been a cultural go-to since the Middle Ages. It’s also a great cooking herb and I frequently use it in my incense, so I always have some handy. If you are looking for sleep, Lavender is your friend.
Chamomile has many medicinal properties when consumed as a tea or infusion. However, the energies and aromas are also attributed to cleansing of negative energy, purifying and calming. They have a slightly sweet apple like scent and are a great building block for sleep sachets.
Rosemary:
With a wide array of medicinal uses, and culinary uses- there is always Rosemary in my kitchen. Rosemary is used to amplify all kinds of magic as well as promote memory and protection. You can add Rosemary to amplify what you already have, but more importantly to protect you from bad dreams, and help you remember your dreams if that is something you struggle with. A member of the mint family, Rosemary is a fragrant perennial and is easy to find anywhere.
Eucalyptus:
Another plant that has its fair share of medicinal purposes, which is what makes it a staple in so many homeopathic kitchens. Eucalyptus is also known for its strong refreshing scent. A little goes a long way, but Eucalyptus has been known to stimulate the immune system, provide clarity in dreams and help induce creativity- if you are looking to add a bit of vibrancy to your resting hours.
Is one of my absolute favorite herbs. It is versatile and easy to grow should you choose to do so. Some unknowing people even consider it a weed. Since Mugwort is used in a variety of cuisines around the world it is fairly easy to find in most Natural food stores. She does contain a chemical called thujone that can induce a sense of being “high” in large quantities, as such- some people consider Mugwort to be dangerous. Mugwort aides in providing a restful nights sleep when drank as a tea or tincture, but used in a sleep sachet can also invite lucid dreaming. If you are trying to work through a particularly difficult dream sequence, using Mugwort for lucid dreaming is an excellent way to be able to affect different choices you may need to work through.
Most people associate roses with love magic, and there is something to be said for that. However different parts of the Rose flower have a myriad of uses. Roses also invoke creativity, and are again a subtle way to invite creativity into your dreams. My sister learned how to grow beautiful roses of all colors and types from my Uncle Alois when he was still alive so I usually have easy access to different colors of rose petals for different purposes. (you can also just buy rose petals at the floral section of any grocery store or buy them dried either online or from a local shop).
Herbal Shops:
I have a few herbal shops I am familiar with and really like, some of which ship nationwide if you are not sure where to start:
Happy Health High Horny Herbs:
Don’t giggle at the name, just trust me. This store is in Tempe, AZ but also ships nationwide. Their main website is Plant Pleasures (rbbotanicals.com) but you can also find them on a brief google search or on Instagram. I like their web format because you can sort different plants, resins, etc. by what you are trying to do and I think that is a great feature for beginners if you are just learning what does what.
Tenzing Momo:
For my Seattlites- this shop is a local favorite. Located in Pike’s Place they sell a lot more than just bulk herbs. I’ve never had a bad interaction there, the people are great, and it smells amazing. Not only that, but if you are looking for some instructional material (on everything from herbs to mushrooms, and a range of spirituality books), this is the place for you. These guys also ship; however if you are in the area- I highly suggest you go in person. Tenzing Momo | Tenzingmomo.com
Moddejonge’s herbals:
This woman does not ship that I know of, but I highly recommend if you are local to the Seattle area. This private shop does have limited hours (Tuesday- Saturday 12P- 5P) but I not only love the shop but the owner. She is educational, and very kind. You can find her on Facebook @ Moddejonge’s Herbals.
Reminder:
The important thing about making sleep sachets is to set your intentions as you make them. The plants themselves have set properties, yes. But never underestimate the power of energies and intentions. Magic is, in and of itself, the art of manifestation. Sleep sachets can be made from anything: Cheesecloth tied with twine or ribbon, I have a collection of small drawstring bags I have either found or were packaging for gifts, if you are really dedicated to the experience I also know a friend who sewed/ crocheted her own bag and then embroidered it to further set her intentions (plus it was fun). The possibilities are endless.
Hopefully, this helped give you some ideas, or sends you in the right direction. Please feel free to chime in, share your thoughts, or share your projects. If you’re a skagit local, you can come find us at the Mirkwood Magical Bazaar as we’re adding a new set of sleep sachett for begginers to our wares.
It’s baking day, and in light of the upcoming festival of Brigid I thought I would share my favorite recipe for Pulla. Traditionally a Finnish sweet bread, there are tons of variations on texture and spice blend. This one happens to be my grandmother’s. Technically, you can prep Pulla into any shape, but I was taught by braiding and I’ve always kind of stuck to that. Since Brigid is frequently associated with Braids and crosses, I somehow always associate the two.
This particular loaf is delicious with coffee, or a bit of honey or butter; not that that is particular shocking since it is traditionally eaten with coffee. It is soft and chewy with an aromatic blend of spices that will always warm my heart.
The Not So Secret of Making Pulla
In my humble opinion, what really makes your pulla next level is the quality/ type of your spices. In this case- spring for green cardamom, especially if you can get whole pods. Black cardamom will work- but green is in its own class. It take only the work of minutes to grind fresh pods into the most amazing flavor you’ve ever tasted. Bread takes hours too make correctly anyways- its worth the 3 minutes with a mortar and pestle/ molcajete. Some grocery stores now sell pods, additionally I know world market sells it and you can also get it online and from some smaller specialty stores.
Baking sheet or stone wear (I am partial to stone wear as it leads to better crust).
Pulla Prodecure:
Begin by Scalding your milk in a small, heavy bottomed saucepan. You can scald milk in any saucepan- but its easier if its double bottomed as there is less chance of burning. You want small bubbles to be forming around the edge of the pan but not boiling. It will sometimes develop a small film on top- this is okay. Remove milk from heat. Add half of your cardamom to the milk and let it steep as it cools (this step is not necessary but definitely helps increase the flavor). Milk will need to cool to just above room temperature. Warm is okay- but hot will kill your yeast.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle (or a large bowl if you plan on mixing by hand) combine yeast with 1 tsp of the sugar. Add the warm water and let sit 5 minutes to allow the yeast to bloom. DO NOT RUSH THIS STEP.
Add milk, remaining sugar, remaining cardamom, eggs, and salt.
Begin adding flour, one cup at a time until you reach 5 cups. Let mix 1-2 minutes until mostly smooth. It is important that the dough have a few minutes to mix and develop gluten strands before you proceed to the next step, butter impedes the formation of gluten so if you add the butter to soon you will end up with tough, dense bread.
With the mixer still mixing, slowly pour in melted butter and continue to mix until dough is smooth and shiny. Once butter is completely absorbed, add the remaining flour ½ cup at a time until smooth again.
Place dough in a greased bowl and cover with a tea towel. Let sit in a warm, humid place until doubled in size (roughly 45 minutes).
Gently deflate and empty out onto a lightly floured surface. Break dough into 3 equal chunks.
Working with one third at a time, split each third into either halves or thirds again and braid in a 3 or 4 strand braid (2 chunk= 4 strand braid; 3 chunks= traditional braid).
Gently move braided loves to baking pans and let rise again 20 minutes.
Brush with egg wash.
Bake for 25 minutes at 375 degrees. Cool Fully before eating. Do not skip the cooling step. I know that it can be tempting to cut into a loaf of bread fresh out of the oven, and you CAN eat it still warm, but it needs to be 90% cool. This is where gluten cells solidify, air cells set, and most of your crust development occurs. Cutting bread early can leave you with collapsed, structureless, and gummy bread.
Feel Free to play with spice blends and amounts. Some people will top their Pulla with sliced almonds or include raisins or dried berries. If you’re looking for more bread tips and tricks, check out the rest of our bread 101 series here!
Hello Adventurer! Nice to see you back in the Guild Hall! Are you ready for our next lesson? Now that we’ve talked about world building, and we’ve discussed the benefits of D&D, as well as gone over some of our favorite beginners’ tools– it’s time to talk characters. Specifically: How to build a playable D&D Character.
Anybody can slap together a race, class, and some basic stats and run with it. But that’s not the same thing as creating a playable D&D character with depth that is believable and fun for you to interact with. We’re talking about the kind of character that your DM falls in love with and therefore can’t kill. Well, they can still kill them, it’ll just be a lot harder for them to bring themselves to do it.
Resources that will help you Build a Playable D&D Character:
D&D players handbook: we talked about this in a previous post. You can read more about it here.
Ultimate RPG Character Backstory Guide: also on that list of resources for beginners’, this is where this book is really going to be your best friend.
You and your brain.
Building a Playable D&D Character
I won’t walk you through every single step in detail because you don’t need me for that. We’re talking Nitty Gritty 4 Dimensional Characters here, Backstory, personality, believability, the whole shebang. I’ll still cover the basics, because there are some things to consider. But for an in-depth look at the races, classes etc. you will want to refer to your D&D players handbook, or your DM if it’s a homebrew campaign and you maybe have some more race options you’d like to explore.
Select your Race:
This will be the foundation of your stats and your skill set. Refer to your D&D handbook. If you are selecting a home brew race you will need to work with your DM to reference believable/ reasonable stats/ race advantages etc.
Select your Class:
if you are playing 5E your base options are barbarian, bard, cleric, druid, fighter, monk, paladin, ranger, rogue, sorcerer, warlock, wizard, blood hunter. Refer to your D&D handbook for a breakdown of each.
Choose your alignment:
this is the beginning of believability in a playable D&D Character. Some races are inclined towards certain alignments (ie dwarves: lawful good, Tiefling: Chaotic neutral) that being said you still have flexibility SO LONG AS it can be explained or rationalized by your backstory. Think about the kind of character you want to build. This selection impacts your character’s morals and decision-making process.
Alignment is an X/Y axis scenario (X: lawful, chaotic, Neutral Y: Good, Evil, Neutral). Both Axis’ have a neutral component.
Lawful: The rules matter more to me than individuals. “The Law is hard but it is the Law.”
Good: Other People’s well-being matters more than own. “For the Greater Good.”
Chaotic: Individuals matter more to me than the rules. “You say rules, I say Guidelines.”
Evil: My own wellbeing is more important than rules or the general public. “I am my own Rule.”
Neutrals: My opinion of what is more important is on a case-by-case basis. “The Devil is in the details.”
Lawful Evil:
A lawful evil character is going to follow a strict moral code. It might be warped, sure. But they are going to follow the letter of the law just as much as a lawful good character. They’re just following their own law. Think Darth Vader or Lord Voldemort.
Lawful Good:
A lawful good character is going to follow the letter of the law for the greater good, regardless of what that means for themselves. You see this a lot with Paladin types. A good example is Captain America.
Lawful Neutral:
we do what we must. They are characterized by being bound to a code or set of rules. They may not agree with all of those rules, but they understand the necessity of following them for a functional society. The punisher is a good example of this.
Chaotic Good:
Chaotic Good characters are going to do what they believe to be right for an individual regardless of what the law says (think Robin Hood).
Chaotic Neutral:
A Chaotic Neutral Character is the essence of “I do what I want when I want as I see fit.” These characters do have moral codes and beliefs that they live by, but it is on a case-by-case basis and they take all the semantics into their account. Decisions are made at their discretion. Riddick is a great example of Chaotic Neutral.
Chaotic Evil:
In contrast, a chaotic evil character is going to say “Fuck the rules and fuck you.” The Joker.
Neutral Good:
Gandalf The Grey is a prime example of “Neutral good” in that he has a strong desire to do good and make the world a better place, but unlike a lawful good he is willing to compromise on societal correctness to do so (insert every instance in which he utilizes hobbits to achieve his long term goals), occasionally seen as unreliable but largely at the end of the day they are about balance and acknowledging that there are multiple sides to every situation and decisions are not a one size fits all.
True Neutral:
True Neutral is less common because it is harder to play than you might suspect and it’s easy to accidently slip into “Neutral Good” as the line is very fine- this is one of my favorites and I think this excerpt from Gamer’s Decide explains it best: “The True Neutral alignment represents a character who is neutral on all alignments, and does not feel strongly about good, evil, law, or chaos. They may act in their own self-interest, but they do not have a particular moral or ethical code that they follow. They may act to preserve balance or neutrality, but they are not necessarily committed to doing so.” Geralt of Rivia is an excellent example of true neutral.
An Additional tool for this is the Save the Cat Prompt on Page 16 of the RPG backstory builder.
Choose Your Background:
Here you will also want to refer to your player handbook for the basic categories. You can also chat with your DM for a homebrew to customize something that matches your character better. Remember that this is not your backstory- it’s your background. In the vaguest of terms think of it as the style of your upbringing: Urchin vs Noble vs Criminal vs Hermit etc. each one comes with its own set of proficiencies or perks.
Spend some time thinking about this, as this is what you will build your backstory off of (or if you’re like me you already have your backstory and you’re going to pick the background that fits with it the best and gives you the proficiencies you want or are looking for.) You can use the roll technique and use some personality traits from the handbook if you want or pull your own, but this is where your characters quirks start to develop.
Arm Yourself:
Spend some time thinking about how you want your character to be involved in combat. This is heavily affected by your race and class but I have seen some unconventional blends that have worked. Its all about believability. If you are a physical fighter instead of a spell caster etc. you may want to spend some extra time in chapter 5 of the Player’s handbook as it goes into detail about different types of weapons and may give you some ideas, or templates to pull unconventional weapons from.
Write a basic backstory:
You don’t have to be an award winning novelist. Or even a good writer. I urge people to try for a paragraph or so, but I also totally get if you have an idea in your head but you aren’t an avid writer. My husband uses bullet points for the ideas he has and the things that are important to him and doesn’t bother stringing them into paragraphs. He can talk to you about his character but isn’t going to write a story.
However your brain works- write down your origin story: Who are you? Where do you come from? Why are you adventuring? What is your purpose? Who raised you? If you were making a 30 second intro clip for your character’s video game- what’s the premise?
Let’s Get Gritty:
So you have your basic build. Now let’s take basic and build it 4 dimensional. Let’s give it personality, nuance, believability, and pizazz. Nobody plays D&D to be boring- that’s what real life is for. D&D operates in the realm of possibility. Have fun. Play with it. This is how we take the basics of stats and story, and add flesh and blood until we have a playable D&D Character.
Appearance:
maybe you thought this would go in the generic section, but I want you to go beyond how tall you are, what color you hair is, and what color you are based on your dragonborn heritage. Picture your character clearly in your head.
Mikaela’s OC Niamh “Dragonheart” Rumnaheim with Pipsqueak drawn by Chris Vernam
How has their lifestyle affected their physique? Calloused hands could just as easily be from a lifetime of baking bread as they can from hefting a sword. Is your profession or background reflected in your wardrobe or jewelry? Could someone guess what you do based on your appearance or gear? What’s the likelihood of someone guessing and getting wrong? Are the little splatters of pigment on your fingertips from ink or the toxins you lace your weapons with? Do you have freckles? Identifying tattoos? What is your body language like? Do you come across cocky? Mousy? Stuffy? Intelligent? Might your appearance intimidate others or impact how villagers view you? Do you face any biases because of your appearance?
Language:
A big portion of buidling a playable D&D character is developing parts of them that you can interact with and bring to life. How does your character speak? What’s their vocabulary like? Do they have any phrases or terms that they use regularly? This is a great way to add depth and believability to a character and make game play more fun.
A sorcerer is going to have a much different vocabulary than a soldier or a priest. Does their hometown impact their accent or their colloquialisms? Can other people tell where they are from based on their speech? Is there something that makes their vernacular unique? A fun little added tool you can use in addition to these questions is the idiom generator on page 14 of the RPG backstory guide.
Religion and Beliefs:
In addition to whatever your D&D ‘deity’ is, or two whom your character pays homage, spend some time thinking about what their beliefs are. Do they actively practice their religion or passively believe in something? How much does it affect their day to day life? Do they observe any strange or interesting holidays? A fun (though not all inclusive) prompt for holidays is on page 18 of the RPG character backstory.
Core lessons:
A good way to build out a playable D&D character is to think about all formative things your character has learned up until the start of the campaign. All real people have them. life events and lessons that have shaped how we view and interact with the world. These should be based on your characters traits and backstory but with more detail. Try for a minimum of 5. What events, choices, or traumas have they lived through that have shaped their character? An amazing set of 5 questions to help you with this is on page 26 of the RPG Character backstory Guide.
Party Preferences:
What kind of company do you keep? Obviously, you don’t get to pick what kind of characters your friends or party members choose to play, or what your DM evilly decides to do with that. BUT based on your backstory and character you should be able to describe who your character would like to adventure with, or if there is anybody your character would absolutely not do well with. It will affect how your character interacts with the other player characters as well as any NPC’s your DM cooks up.
Taylor’s OG Campaign Party
Think about it like this: if your backstory is written around the fact that your family was murdered by a war band of goblins and another party member happens to be half goblin… you might have some prejudices or some strained interactions to work through. It will also be a factor in how you interact (or should interact) with NPC’s. remember- you are not you, you are your character. An example of this concept can be found on page 28 of the RPG character backstory guide.
Add detail to your core stats:
Sure, a barbarian is strong, but go deeper. How are you strong compared to other barbarians? How did you come to be this way? Of course a rogue is high in dexterity (if they’re a good rogue) but how might someone else be able to tell you’re dexterous, what might hint at your master thief skills? There’s a fun exercise in the RPG character guide called “Across a crowded Tavern” on page 32 that will highlight some ideas for this.
What drives you forward:
when all seems lost and things aren’t going according to plan (and they won’t). what inner strength, power, ideal, or memory pushes you to keep going. What stops your character from tapping out even when 80% of them is ready too? Check out the exercise on page 45 of the RPG book for some examples.
Create a mental snapshot of home:
what did your childhood home look like and how might that environment have impacted who your character currently is? Were you raised in a city? A village? A tribe? In a metropolis or a forest? A cave dwelling civilization? Where did you call home? where did you usually sleep? Do you miss it? Where did people socialize? What did community interaction look like? What did people respect? Who was in charge? Check out page 47 of the backstory guide for more prompts.
Creeds, mottos, and ideals:
this is different than beliefs, lessons, or idioms- even though lessons and idioms typically have meaning or deeper wisdom in them. Not a slogan, or a catch phrase (although those are equally endearing in a character- we see you Naruto). It doesn’t even necessarily have to be something your character technically excels at but rather something they hold in high esteem, a trait they aspire to, or something they believe in outside of religion. These are statements of belief outside of deities. Examples might be:
Life is what we make it.
We have nothing if we don’t have our morals.
The only thing stronger than a man’s given word is his heart.
Power is the only guarantee of freedom
We always have a choice.
It’ll feel better when it quits hurting.
Valuable advice:
what is the best piece of advice your character has ever received? If they could pass on any one piece of advice what would it be? Similar to creeds and mottos, but distinct in that this is something they have learned, that they live by, and act on whenever possible. A belief they hold in the livable present. Examples might include:
When you get the chance to dance, dance.
The man is the head of the family, but the woman is the neck and she can turn the head any way she wants.
Tuck your chin, you’re going to get hurt, expect it and be ready.
This too shall pass
The friends who criticize your actions are the ones who really care about you. If they didn’t care they wouldn’t waste their breathe.
If you love something enough, and for long enough, the rest of the world will eventually have no choice but to accept it, regardless of its original perception of it.
All things worth having are worth working for.
You’re always going to be “too much” of something to someone, do not dim your light for anybody.
Fears, Flaws, and weaknesses:
nobody, or character for that matter, is perfect. Even superman has kryptonite. To make a character really fun to both play, but also interact with for your DM and party members come up with a short list of “shortcomings” or flaws. They could be major or minor, or something your character is actively working on improving, extra props if at least one of them is something that your other party members can leverage.
You snore terribly.
You’re a dwarf that can’t hold your ale- a complete lightweight, the family doesn’t talk about it.
You have a gambling problem
You are a terrible cook- like give someone food poisoning bad.
You are severely ADHD- this causes problems in combat, problems with your memory, and with everyone elses sleep schedule. You lose everything contstantly.
You have a soft spot for strays and are always trying to “adopt” the local critters. Even when your party can’t hide them, feed them, or otherwise deal.
You are terrified of the dark- dungeons, am I right?
You can’t swim
Terrible anemia
Petrified of zombies
Invasive thoughts with no filter. Your party does not appreciate you making your disturbing thoughts their newest fears.
You have a crippling fear of heights.
Consider your long-term goal:
I want to leave you with an idea for character development as you go forward to create. Remember that what you are building is the base of your character. The point of D&D is to play/tell a story. Characters develop during stories. What you are making is the origin story, the idea, and the potential. But remember that your character is going to interact with others, be subject to circumstance, and hopefully have the opportunity to grow. Don’t try and create a level 10 character with an “I saved the world” backstory. That’s what the story is about.
Mikaela’s OC Pipsqueak drawn by The Polite Pencil (Micheil Salmons)
But also, do not limit your character ideas to what your current stats are- your character is as fluid as its development is. Some gardeners become protectors in great stories. If the templates and basic things don’t seem like they are ticking all the right boxes, or that nothing quite describes the character you’d like to build…. Remember that multi-classing is a thing. The possibilities are endless depending on what choices you are willing to make. In much the same way as real life you can choose to learn multiple things to create your own field of study/ specialty. If you’d like to learn more about multi-classing, check out page 163 of the D&D Players handbook.
Now go out there, build an awesome character, and keep your eyes peeled for our next D&D post where Taylor will cover actual execution and playing of this awesome character you have created.
Happy Tarot Tuesday! Let’s talk today about another simple ‘spread’ for self-reflection. I say ‘spread’ loosely this time, as this is technically a single card pull. Despite being small, it’s great for getting to know your deck and heavy on the introspective aspect- which I will always love. For this spread we will again be using the Dreams of Gaia Deck by Ravynn Phelan- but you can use any deck. Today we’re going to be talking about the “Guide Spread”.
The Guide
There is only one card to define in this go around, because well, it’s a single card draw as we’ve said. This card is meant to guide you, help you reflect on something that is prevalent in your life at this time, and can be used to help you reflect on your actions preemptively. Sometimes a guide card may only be relevant for a day. Maybe you happen to pull a card relevant to something that is a larger or more ongoing issue. On a rare occasion a card may need to keep you company for longer than a day.
Performing the Guide Spread
My regular recommendations for tarot apply here: give yourself ample time to complete it and find a quiet space where you can relax and focus. Keep a journal or notebook handy, as well as your guidebook. Find appropriate lighting and light a candle or incense if that helps you relax, same with music/background noise. The point is to intentionally relax and be present in your reflection.
Shuffle. There is no right or wrong way, just shuffle. Stop when it feels right, or your hands get tired. Whatever comes first. Whether you cut your deck or not is up to you.
Before you delve into meanings and reflection, spend some time looking at the artwork, just examining the card. How does its artwork make you feel without immediately knowing what it means?
Review the meaning of the card and take into account if it is upright or reversed/blocked. Reflect on how this may affect your day, if there is something happening that this could help/ hinder with? I find this a good tool to reflect on whatever quality the card is addressing and assess whether I think this is a strength of mine or maybe a weakness I need to pay attention to as I go about my day.
Take your time with this part of the process, as sometimes there are the immediate reactions and the secondary ones after you’ve had a few minutes to think and consider. Don’t judge your reflection as positive or negative. You are simply examining the prompt as it is.
Closing the Reading:
Take a few minutes to write about your experience. This is where we want to be thinking about how this makes us feel. Note that I do not say “where we judge the reading”. That’s not the point, you can feel positively, or negatively, or inspired, or melancholy- whatever it may be; without judging the answer. One is a sensation, the other is a statement. Be careful with this.
Keeping a journal will give you something to look back on, a way to notice trends, and a second round of reflection that is slightly different. Some people (like myself) process differently when we’re writing and the act of moving your hands to reflect things helps anchor the process into linear thoughts when your brain might otherwise be a basket of ferrets on espresso.
The point is that this is between you and yourself. Which means that honest reflection is not only encouraged, but necessary- especially if you can get out of the habit of judging yourself and just letting yourself feel what you feel without commenting on it.
Now you’re ready to go about your day with a reflection excersize done and your mind prepared to be present and take the day as it comes!
We’d love to hear about your experiences with intentional living and I hope you give this a shot.
Happy New Years! Already 2023 is gone and we are entering a whole new cycle around the sun. I’m not usually much of a ‘New Year’s Resolution Girl’ because I feel like I spend a lot of time throughout the year setting myself new markers, milestones, and magnetic goals as I hit previous ones. I don’t wait for the New Year anymore because I hear my dad in my head saying, ‘no time like the present’.
But it hasn’t always been like this for me. I was, and sometimes still am the person that struggles with hitting goals because I struggle to make and keep routines. However, I’ve spent a lot of time over the last few years figuring out what works for me.
We all know the pattern: January first sees an upswing in ‘New Year, New Me’, and by February more than half of us have fallen off the bandwagon. I even went through several years of ‘I’m not even going to set a Resolution because I know I won’t keep it’. In honor of New Years, I want to talk about setting goals. More specifically setting Magnetic Goals. With consistency and work, every day can be New Year’s.
None of this is anything I came up with. I am no expert or guru. I don’t have a degree in psychology or credentials to back it. But I do have my own experiences, several years of trial, error, and frustration figuring out what works for me. As well as lots of books, workshops, counseling, and classes to pull from. I’m hoping I can save you from some of the same frustrations so that you can learn to set Magnetic Goals yourself. At the bottom of this article, you will find a list of some of those resources.
The problem with Setting Goals…
One of my biggest obstacles with ADHD is feeling easily overwhelmed, which leads to executive dysfunction and decision paralysis…that can make it very hard to meet goals. As a result, I spent a lot of time referring to myself as “A quitter” or “An Idea Hopper”. If you speak that over yourself often enough- it can really undermine your confidence over time. It becomes its own self-fulfilling prophecy.
Think about how magnets work. Have you ever tried to force together opposing sides of a set of magnets? When the Polarity is off, nothing you do will make them stay together. They will resist the second you let go, pushing against themselves with tension in the opposing direction. Unknowingly, a lot of people do this to themselves with goal setting. They create goals in situations and with lifestyles that are polarizing and doomed to not mesh.
But if you flip those exact same magnets around, you get an attraction so strong it acts as a sort of glue, You almost can’t keep them apart. This is what we want: Positive Tension. Magnetic Goals. It’s one thing to say it however, and quite another to figure out how to apply it.
Creating a ‘Magnetic Goals’ Environment
Creating reachable goals is all about curating an environment that is designed to make it as hard as possible to fail. That doesn’t mean setting the bar so low that it’s a tripping hazard in hell; because that’s not a goal. But it means setting yourself up as much as possible for attainable success. Its about creating tension, especially if you’re an ADHD’r like me. That tension is going to keep you engaged, which is crucial to meeting goals.
A roadmap to Magnetic Goals
Actionable steps:
The first step to setting magnetic goals is to break up bigger goals into actionable steps. By actionable steps I mean physical things you can do. We’re not listing out all the passive things outside our sphere of influence or how the stars need to align for something to happen. I was first introduced to this concept in my freshman year of college, but it didn’t hit home until I took an accountability class that was actually taught by my cousin, Angela Totman.
This is the biggest step I find I can take to curate success. It prevents the big picture from seeming like too much or too far away, thereby causing that pesky paralysis. In a way, it goes without saying. But I’m going to say it anyways: baby steps. Take whatever your goal is and break it down into the smallest steps possible. For me, not only is it much easier to “take the next step” than it is to contemplate climbing Everest. But also, each tiny achievement reinforces the bigger goal. Over time, that will help rewrite the personal narrative you have told yourself about your success for who knows how long.
The Risk of Losing Magnetism
When magnets get too far apart, what happens? They stop pulling towards each other, their gravitational influence ends, tension is lost, and they collapse. Your goals are exactly the same. If your bigger goal is miles and miles away from your current capacity now- it will seem so grand that it becomes separate from yourself. Because I could never do that! As a result, you don’t even try. Why would you if you’ve already written yourself off?
But if your goal is just a little bit outside of your current capacity, you can stretch yourself that little bit. All of a sudden- that’s worth trying for. There’s tension when something is just out of reach. And then you just have to do it again and again and again.
Be specific.
Uber specific. Let’s say your bigger goal is to buy a house. Your actionable steps might be get your credit score up, talk to a mortgage professional about what you’d need to qualify, save up for a down payment, and talk to a realtor.
That’s a great place to start: smaller chunks, physical things, sorted in order of urgency. But it’s not enough. There’s a lot of grey area left there for inaction. I don’t know about you, but if there’s a loophole, my brain will find it. Quantifying what each of these steps looks like is the only way to tell you when you’ve hit the next step. That was something Angie was big on: It had to be measurable. She called it getting in the weeds.
You need to define each of those actionable steps. Sometimes those steps require micro steps of their own- but this is how you build your road map. A better example of the previous list is: Get your credit score up 80 points by talking to a credit specialist and following their advice. Research mortgage companies to decide who you’d like to use and make an appointment for a consult; take action on any steps they give you. Set aside $100 from each paycheck into a savings account until you reach $______. Talk to a realtor about what you’re looking for in a home and what kind of loan you are looking at with the downpayment you have saved.
Set yourself deadlines for each step:
This kind of feeds into being specific but I have time blindness on a monumental scale, so to me this is worth noting separately. If you are not explicit with deadlines you will say “someday” forever. Instead try “I’m going to make an appointment with the credit specialist tomorrow”. “I am going to have my credit score up 80 points in 6 months by following the list of steps they gave me”. Be realistic, but specific. I work better under the pressure of a deadline and that deadline allows me to hover in the sweet spot of ‘baby steps’ meets ‘I can do anything under pressure’. That’s the ‘magnetic goals’ tension we want.
Create routines that support each step through habit stacking:
Routine is so HARD when you have ADHD. It’s boring, it’s not stimulating. There’s zero novelty in it and therefore no dopamine. If there’s no dopamine, there’s no productivity. I have struggled with this and the resulting dopamining my ENTIRE life. My need for structure combined with my utter inability to build lasting routines led for the longest time to deep feelings of anger and shame towards myself “what is so hard about this?”, “Why can’t I just do it?”, “What, am I stupid?”
Two books shattered my understanding of this. A combination of habit stacking behaviors and the compound effect gave me not only a better understanding of positive reinforcement in the brain, but also gave me the grace to allow myself to succeed a little at a time instead of feeling guilt that I couldn’t do it all at once. One percent better every day is momentous growth compared to no growth at all because you’ve paralyzed yourself with a lack of systems. I have both books listed in the resources below.
Surround yourself with supportive and like minded people:
This is crucial. We’re talking about creating environments of success, and the people you surround yourself with are central to that.
At least one person that is farther ahead in your goal than you are:
someone whose tail feathers you can grab onto to keep you engaged and retain that tension. Even better if you can get them to take you under their wing. If your goal is more niche- you might be limited to following them on social media but even better if you can find someone in your community. More or less, a mentor or close competition. If you’re really dedicated, find both.
An accountability buddy:
In some ways this sounds so silly, and it can be uncomfortable if you’re an introvert like me. Pick someone you’re comfortable being honest with, accountability doesn’t work if you’re sugar coating the truth. You want somebody that is supportive of your goal, will hold you accountable, but will also be encouraging when you mess up, otherwise the ‘accountability’ can be confidence undermining. If you don’t have someone like this in your life, this is where accountability coaching can be helpful because it teaches you to be better accountable to yourself.
A Supportive community:
you can only control your environment to a certain extent. You still have to go to work, you still have to interact with society, you can’t control what other people say or think. People are People, so you’re going to encounter negativity and disbelief. The bigger the goal, the more you’re going to get. One of the best things I learned from my time with World Wide Dream Builders is ‘the solution to pollution is dilution’.
The more positive, supportive people you have in your corner, the easier it is to dilute the negativity you can’t control and stay focused on your magnetic goals. This doesn’t mean tell everybody about your goal. In fact, it’s better if you don’t. Studies show that sharing goals too much or too early can trigger early dopamine reward, reducing your motivation to reach them. Pick a few select people to share with.
Resources for Magnetic Goals:
Angela Totman:
Angie has a 20 year career in financial education and entrepreneurship training. She is a speaker, writer, financial coach and systems and accountability expert. The co-author of Your Financial Mastery, a college level financial literacy curriculum. Angela is also a featured contributor in Think and Grow Rich for Women, written by international bestselling author, Sharon Lechter, in cooperation with the Napoleon Hill Foundation. She is the Founder of Hero Life Alliance and Vice President and COO at Pay your Family First. Angela has dedicated her career to empowering others through educational programs and practical application of tactical action steps to drive results.
Her accountability course really helped me break down some mental barriers and set the stage for future successes by understanding where I was shooting myself in the foot. She was the person that helped me understand the difference between ‘setting a goal’ and ‘creating Magnetic Goals’. She has one of the best Grit mentalities I’ve ever seen and the discipline to match it. And If you can’t tell- I trust her a lot. You can find more about her on LinkedIn, Facebook, or her website for the Hero Life Alliance.
Atomic Habits by James Clear:
one of two books that entirely shifted my understanding of how to build lasting habits and systems. This book is a wonderful read, though in some ways it was hard because there’s just so much truth in it. Atomic Habits taught me the principle of Habit Stacking that I referenced above. After reading it I felt like someone had been gatekeeping this information from me for my entire life. This is one of those books that made me question the education system and ‘why isn’t this taught in school?!’. I reread it regularly. If you want magnetic goals, this is where I’d start.
The Compound Effect Darren Hardy:
The other of two books that changed my perspective on creating habits and the power of consistency. There are so many useful apply-in-the-moment exercises, it really helped me put things into place and explained concepts in a way that made sense. You can purchase a copy of the book and find more tips and tricks on Darren Hardy’s Website.
Grit by Angela Duckworth:
This book is so fascinating, it was the first time I really reflected on my ability to believe in myself and trust my own word. This was when I stopped referring to myself as a quitter and started actively exercising my grit muscle, because it was the first time I’d ever heard it referred to as a muscle. Ms. Duckworth’s book was the first thing that ever described it in a way that made me understand that it was something I could cultivate even though I didn’t feel like I was born with it.
Goals by Zig Ziglar:
Zig Ziglar was a famous motivational speaker, and many of the mindset quotes you’ve probably seen me post on our Instagram are from him. He is the author of over 17 personal development and success books. You will find him referenced by a lot of other Grit Paragons in the modern world. While he passed in 2012 this book remains relevant and is a great source of positive input for your ‘dilution tank’. This book specifically covers some of the things I have found most useful in great detail.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey:
This book is amazing because I am a hands on, learn-by-doing person and this book is actually a guided journal. It really helps with the practical application of elevating magnetic goals effectiveness.
The Power of Discipline by Daniel Walter:
I picked up this book because ‘discipline’ is something I have always struggled with, even with things I really want to do or complete, the mental toughness portion has always been a struggle for me. This book reframed some of my misconceptions regarding willpower and discipline.
Go for Stupid by Steve Sims:
I had the opportunity to hear him speak at The Refiners Conference in 2021 and I have been hooked on his content since. A self-labeled ‘Creative Disruptor’ I have never seen someone in his field convey information quite the way he does. He is also the Author of ‘Bluefishing, the Art of Making Things Happen’. This man has made a living for himself by setting ridiculous goals and achieving them. My favorite line of his is ‘how far can I take this?’
Go for Stupid covers how to ignore what others think and how not to shrink your goals in response to negative feedback and ‘gotcha’ culture. This book is PACKED with truth bombs and useful tips. He’s also a very useful person to follow on social media. It may sound a little backwards since I’m talking about creating tension by using small steps to create magnetic goals, but that requires you to have a big enough vision to excite you to action. This is the book for that. you can find more about Steve Sims on his website.
Don’t Get Overwhelmed
I know this was a ton of information, but I truly hope this can become a guide to setting magnetic goals that you can refer to later. Don’t let yourself become overwhelmed by the resources either. Pick one at a time. It definitely takes time too. Learning doesn’t happen overnight and its something that I will probably have to practice for the rest of my life, I feel like its worth it for how much of my life it affects, and how its changed my relationship with myself.
Like I said, I am by no means an expert. Far From it. But the resources I have listed above are all from people who ARE experts. I really encourage you to lean into their knowledge because its been life changing for me. Trust me, If I can do it, so can you.
Okay nerds… Buckle up because I have a lot to say this time.
Today I want to talk about creating your own Dungeons and Dragons campaign or more specifically world building. A while back we did a video on our personal experiences from when Mikaela and I were first learning to play DnD where I mention not ever having DM’d. For the uninitiated, that means to be the Dungeon Master or the one creating the world, plot, deciding dice role outcomes, etc.
DM’ing is very underrated. The DM is (for lack of a better descriptor coming to my mind at the moment), the game god. It is a lot of work, prep, blood, sweat, tears, and love to be a good DM. But it is also very rewarding! You get to see your world come alive and be a part of not one character… but EVERY character as you are the playing all the NPC’s but also helping to develop and grow your players characters over time. You are constantly flexing your creativity, quick thinking, organization and, depending on the DM, your acting.
That being said, the prospect of being a DM can be intimidating. I can say that for a loooong time I avoided it like the plague because I knew it would be a commitment and I didn’t feel I would be able to do it justice. Earlier this year I decided to say, “fuck it” and start building my own campaign anyways. It may be a learning curve, but I have wanted to try my hand at being on the other side of the table and was done psyching myself out. Turns out my OCD ADHD self LOOOOOOVES world building and what I should have worried about is getting stuck in a creative concept hole.
That being said, I just want to preface my world building process with a couple notes (big surprise since I always do this).
I want to emphasize the distinction that this is about WORLD BUILDING for your campaign. Writing a campaign is like writing a story whereas the world building is just focusing on building the world the story takes place in. You need to take into consideration things like the Big Bad Evil Guy (BBEG), character deadlines, etc but we aren’t focusing on them as that will develop and change to some extent during game play and I could/will eventually go more into that at some point.
I am sure you can find a bunch of other lists and articles that tell you how to world build. They will probably work. At one point or another I looked at some of those lists to make sure I didn’t miss anything. What I want to do today is show you the process that, specifically, I went through and what tools you might use.
I will point out that you could definitely buy one-shots, books of campaigns, maps etc and have just as much fun but this is how to build your own world for a new campaign because worldbuilding is just as much fun as playing in my opinion.
Again, I also want to preface this with the knowledge that there are MANY ways to go about this and none are wrong. This is just what I did. I will also be using my world as an example, so I do not go off into more tangents than is already inevitable with me.
I like to start big and add more details as I go. My thought process behind this is that when writing campaigns, you want to let the world grow with the characters and let the players help build it with you. It was easier for me to consider the bigger picture and start filling in necessaries so they had a starting point with the knowledge that smaller details can, to some extent, be thought of on the spot or become lore through the actions or back stories of my fledgling party.
WHAT TYPE OF GAME PLAY DO YOU WANT?
I am not sure if this first thing is necessarily world building, but the first thing I considered was what kind of campaign I wanted to run. It helps set the tone, what kind of world I want to build, scale of the world, etc. For example, if the campaign you want is going to be a dungeon crawler you might build a high fantasy world OR do a more modern realistic world with Indiana Jones vibes. If you want a suspenseful murder mystery, you could go with a Victorian or a sci-fi space setting. Maybe you really want steampunk political intrigue. The point is that by determining what type of game you want to play; it will hugely affect what type of world you want to build. I also feel like mentioning that you can take inspiration from anywhere and to not avoid mixing and matching things. You are creating a new world so you can have new concepts! But on the flip side of that, do not be ashamed to steal a concept that is already out there and play it with maybe just slight tweaking because your players are going to add their own flavor to it anyways.
In my case, I was building my campaign world off of a book concept I had considered writing. Additionally, I am a huge book worm and also avidly consume Anime and Manga and there were certain tropes and plots that I loved and also wanted to incorporate so I pulled inspiration from a couple places. I decided on a high fantasy style game that combined an adventure/dungeon crawling style with political intrigue. I also love adventurers’ guilds but didn’t necessarily want players in one… maybe just something similar. I also loved the idea of playing something based off either a mirror image of earth or its cultural beliefs. So, imagine if the earth was populated by the myths, legends, and fantasy creatures we write and talk about and in this world, humans and our meta cultures are the stuff of their myths and legends. Again, this was kind of a vague idea at this point, but it gave me a concept to start building everything else on.
This is also less of a step, and more of a reminder for me and you; a tip if you will. When thinking about all the following steps, remember to keep some meta things and change some meta things. What I mean is don’t have a world so far removed conceptually that players can’t understand it or struggle with game play BUT also don’t have it be so normal in comparison to our meta world that it is exactly the same. If NOTHING in your world is relatable there is a steep learning curve. Additionally, it makes it hard for the players to have a starting place to be creative. I love being able to use my own meta knowledge about our world in creative ways… like sciencey shit etc but if NOTHING is applicable in that world it makes it hard for me to improvise. On the flip side, if it mirrors our current world exactly… what is the point? You are describing my reality, not a new world. At that point I would just call it TTRPG Sims… or I would go play my Sims… or even better, walk out my front door and interact with my normie neighbors. You need to change at least one thing about our world and then watch how it affects everything else.
START BIG. HOW IS YOUR WORLD LAID OUT?
Map out continents
Start adding borders…
… Or don’t add borders at all!
This was my big map step. You will constantly be making maps of cities, dungeons, encounters etc. but you need to have a larger, general world for those to fit into. I already said this… but I like to start big and narrow down details later so my next step was creating the world or planet itself. Think about how big you want your world to be. You can start with a universe and then add planets that you add continents to and then later country borders to and so on, and so forth. For this world, I started at the scale of a planet. To start, I drew an equator (there is a reason for this) and then started drawing continents. This was easy for me because, though not exact, I based my continents off our meta world, BUT you could draw literally anything. The sky is the limit. Maybe your whole world is only one continent or a bunch of islands or a single spaceship or everyone lives in ships because there is no land. You get the point.
After that, think about if and how your continents would be further divided up by “human” constructs such as territories or state/country borders. Do they have defined borders or is everyone nomadic? Or maybe the world isn’t very populated and is mostly uninhabited wildlands. When I got to this point, I chose to take a bit of a hybrid approach. A planet is large and if there are multiple continents, it stands to reason that not all of them will be the same. Because I was basing my world off of our myths, legends, cultures, etc. I did research on those cultures and made decisions accordingly. The continent corresponding to our Europe has country borders that are not a mirror of but are vaguely reminiscent to Europe’s countries. The continent corresponding to North America is completely different. I chose to base it off of Native American lore and their cultures as a whole had less defined borders. To reflect this, I chose to show the territories where nations are generally found but avoided hard borders and many (not all) of the nations were nomadic or semi nomadic.
I also started adding major topographical landmarks (think major mountain ranges, great lakes, things big enough to show up on a world map) at this point but I didn’t focus too much on it yet. It is a whole planet, and I could easily get super sucked into this FOREVER.
You do not need to pull all of this from thin air either. Think about your inspirations and work smarter, not harder. I pull images and information from the real world and resources already out there. Here are a couple I use(d) on the regular.
The internet in general- This is obvious. I used this for research and for images. Google search the shit out of everything. I was all about using reputable sources and fact checking but depending on your world and what you are searching for, realism may be less relevant honestly.
Inkarnate – Create Fantasy Maps Online– This is a favorite resource of mine for several reasons. You can use this site to make your own custom maps fairly easily in multiple styles for free and with paid versions. Additionally, there are randomization options for those who want less work or care less about this aspect or are stuck. This service works for world maps but also for cities and dungeons, so it is VERY useful long term. Finally, many users publish their maps for other world builders to use FOR FREE so you can also find a map that suits your world if map making from scratch is not your thing.
AI art- AI gets a bad reputation but if you are looking for fun visuals for your world without spending forever, this is the way to go. As an artist, I sometimes (a lot of the time) hate AI art and what it means for me BUT sometimes I go this route. I just find free programs online and sometimes I know what I want or other times I will use the weird things it makes as inspiration. Either way, I love having visuals for my players and myself and while I enjoy hand making things, I will also supplement with this.
When I talk about thinking of the rules of a planet, I am talking about the laws of nature. Once the campaign is running, this is mostly not thought about in game play because it is second nature (baddump-tsss) to accept those everyday rules. I mean, how often during the day do you consciously think about tectonic plates, gravity, or the tidal currents of the ocean and how that affects landscapes, weather, and where certain things live? The answer is A LOT if you are me but probably not at all if you are the general public. Just think about that for a second though and what this would look like in your world.
I would recommend using our world as a reference for these laws. Remember: keep some, change some. It will make the world more relatable and avoid awkward gameplay. I am not saying that you need to become a meteorologist, zoologist, geologist, etc. to make your world. How in depth you go and how much you change is up to you. I knew I could spend forever creating this new world and never actually play if I got stuck in this. I went VERY DEEP and will probably always be adding to this. What I am saying though is to just put a bit of thought in… I started with these categories for me:
Bonnacon
Tectonics- I went there! You don’t need to. But I just briefly thought about it because it helped me decide where to put mountain ranges and volcanic hotspots. I did use our planet as reference, but I didn’t want placement to be 100% the same.
Seasons- Do you have the same seasons or are they completely different? I kept the same seasons. Both because of familiarity and because a lot of ancient lore revolves around the seasons, so they were relevant. Also, I knew I was going to focus more in other areas and was avoiding even more work.
Natural Disasters- What types are there? Are they more prevalent in certain areas? I decided to keep our normal ones and add a couple new ones since I had a highly magical world. For example, I added a Chaotithaumaturg Storm with is basically a big word describing a huge storm event that happens around areas that are particularly dense with magic, and it causes your own magic to react and manifest in weird ways or not at all.
Gravity- This was easy for me… I kept Earths gravity. This may be different on your planet, spaceship etc. If you are in space, you could have VASTLY different ranges of gravity and that will affect races, game play, technology, flora, fauna, etc.
Distance from Equator- I told you this would be important! Again, because I used earth as a reference, I knew my rules and could mostly ignore its placement BUT, on your planet, think about how this affects everything. On Earth, closer to the equator means more light and warmer weather which means that the races and flora and fauna there have adapted to that. It also means the water in the oceans is warmer near the equator, leading to more hurricanes.
Wind and Ocean Currents- Again, for me, Earth was a reference, and this was one area I chose not to mess with. There is one big thing to remember about currents though if you have different terrain/ continents and it is that currents will follow the path of least resistance. This could mean flowing downhill if we have Earth gravity or up if we have a different gravity rule. If wind hits a mountain range, it will be forced up which will cause different weather on each side of it. Water will flow until it hits an obstacle (like a continent) and then will be redirected to flow along the coast until it is redirected again by another obstacle. When apposing currents meet you could have a strong up or down current or a whirlpool. Just things to think about if you want to make more realistic maps/terrains.
Flora & Fauna- This is where I chose to make more of my changes and where I am still making new things constantly. Think about what plants and animals are in your world and what/where their habitats would be. I kept a lot of our meta plants and kept them native to areas relative to our world while adding larger carnivorous, magical, and monstrous options as well. For the “animals” or creatures in the world I may have gone a bit far (to the point of dichotomous keys). I did keep some of our animals but for the most part I wanted to make run of the mill animals, like pigeons, the equivalent of a mythical creature like a phoenix. Instead of Pigeons, they have something that looks like tiny rat pigeon gryphons called a Rageon. A shifter that turns into an earth wolf? How magical! What is a cow? Instead, my cultures have domesticated and made a global industry out of Bonnacon farming. I just felt like it really made for an immersive world and opened up opportunities for fun interaction.
You don’t have to focus on all these things, or you can look at other “rules” than I have here. I would recommend though that whatever you are thinking about, consider how they interact and change in relation to each other if you tweak just one thing. How would less or more gravity affect your natural disasters? What if there was only 1 season… or 13? And how would that affect how plants, animals, or even people adapted?
TRIBES: WHO, WHERE, AND WHAT ARE THEIR RELATIONS?
So now we have a planet and need to start adding “people” as it may be. I like to think of this in terms of “tribes” because it is a bit more in depth and pushes me to think about things in different ways. Tribes can be defined as:
a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader.
A tribe can be a race in the broadest sense of the word, or we can narrow it down to nationalities, religions, government factions, a club at school, a friend group, etc. I like to start thinking about who my tribes are, where they would be found, and what do their relationships look like. Do you only have 2 races; one that has adapted to water and lives on the coast and an inland hunter gatherer race. Do they get along and trade for resources? Or do they compete and have a long history of conflict? I once again find it easy to start big and narrow it down:
What races inhabit your world? I went high fantasy and had a lot of options since each culture has numerous intelligent characters to turn into races. Just think Celtic Fae or Japanese Oni and the variations within those categories alone. Therefore, I have a very diverse world.
Where does each race live? In my world I based this generally on what culture the mythos is from, but you may need to look at things like where resources would be available and where their physique would make sense. Or maybe your race has to live someplace odd but there is a relevant reason that you are writing into your campaign (ie. dwarves living in trees because of extenuating circumstances no one will tell you even though they hate it).
Next, start dividing into smaller tribes. Maybe it is the scientist in me, but I love to categorize things. First, I started with broader groups that I thought would relate to each other best. In some worlds this could be nationality. I did consider nationalities as a tribe but I actually went with categories of races first such as the fae, shifters, mer people, demons, angels, tauric races, vampiric races, shades and revenants, giants, etc. Within those I then broke them down into subcultures. Take dwarves for example… just to name a few I put in that category I have the Menehune of Hawaii, Duwende of the Filipines, Duergar of Northern England, and the Zwerge of Germany. These were my own categories that I used for my world so I did take some creative license, but you get the point.
Think about how these different categories or tribes interact with each other and why it is how it is. Just as a note, I feel that tribes closer together are more likely to have either the most conflict or the most harmonious relationships. It is this duality of naturally wanting to be seen as unique/different and competing over the same resources while simultaneously having a lot of commonalities due to similar environments and an exchange of goods/ideas. If you are in forced proximity you are bound to either love or hate each other eventually.
Start adding smaller tribes. Here are some I considered/added: countries/ governments, gangs, organizations, guilds, and religions. Maybe in your world it is fleets or packs. Regardless, make yourself some groups and decide who they like and don’t like.
I feel like a lot of other articles that talked about world building didn’t really talk about tribes and their relationships, but I think it makes it more realistic. Especially if you are looking to make a very large world and if this is a campaign you plan on making a long one. It adds layers that you may not interact with at first but will add complexity later.
This was actually a suggestion in a Master Class about Fantasy and Science Fiction Writing by N.K. Jemisin. By this point you should have a very clear idea of what your setting is and who is interacting with your world. Think about your daily routine and what that would look like in the world you are creating. This will help you flush out the minutia like transport, money, language, prepping food, bathroom routines… little things. This is probably where I get stuck the most trying to make things consistent and make sense. N.K. Jemisin listed off some different areas to consider how your world is different or the same as ours: Deviance, Military, urban vs rural, gender, politics, inequality, medicine, technology, health, family, stratification, law, conflict, race, economics, culture, education, religion, environmental, ethnicity, science vs magic (how does it work in your world), and industry. I wouldn’t even know where to start to give examples for this step because once again I went a little cray cray at this point. I decided that like different countries in our world had different day to day routines, currencies, socio-economic structures etc…. so too would mine. I will say that I originally started just flushing out the deets in the area my players started in and am building other cultures etc with my players as we go to an extent. It also helps that I am once again basing much of it off of our meta world so if it is an area of the world that historically bartered and was nomadic… the culture in my new world will barter and be nomadic.
MAKE SOME NPCs… BUT NOT ALL OF THEM.
Okay… Now that we have general groups of people, we need to flush out some NPC’s. Your NPCs should constantly be evolving and growing as the campaign progresses. Don’t worry too much about having the info for every person in the world and their whole genealogy. Just focus on some NPC’s you will need either on a regular basis, to progress plot (like your BBEG), or in your next session. When deciding who to initially create, I asked myself a couple questions:
Who do my players already know? I try to have at least one NPC per player that would be tied to their backstory and the players themselves can help with that.
Who are some of the local vendors?
Who are some local figures of authority?
Who are a couple NPCs that you may NEVER meet but everyone would know their name? This could mean adding celebrities, higher ups in your star fleet, or the king for example.
Who is my main villain?
What NPC’s do I need to progress any story I have?
This is just how I started to get the dice rolling and for each one I tried to make note of a couple things that made them relevant and interesting so that I had a starting point to play them later. Things like how they look, likes or dislikes, their role in the world, maybe a couple sentences on their backstory, a quirk, or a skill that isn’t obvious, but your players could accidentally discover and take advantage of.
There are lot of d100 lists, charts, and online generators to help randomize NPC’s. Here are a couple of resources that I like.
AI art- again, just using free online programs to have visuals for your players.
Dndspeak– This site has lists and AMAZING generators for everything from names, designations, physical traits, character quirks, etc. They have them for fantasy AND scifi themes. Additionally, they have generators and lists for even more than this… loot, locations, weather, wares in a store, dwarven insults… EVERYTHING.
Fantasy NPC Generator with 5E Stat Block (npcgenerate.com)– This generator is nice because it lets you narrow down modifiers like age, race, or profession. It still gives a blurb and description of them but gets in depth enough to describe the voice for DM’s who live more role play. Additionally, it creates a stat block in case they end up in combat or so that you can save it.
Youtube- I watched youtube videos to help create NPC voices. Two in particular that I found helpful were How To Create 100 Distinctly Different Voices by “Improve Your Voice” & Laban’s Eight Efforts demonstration by “David Bareford”.
IS THERE A BASE OR HOME FOR THE PLAYERS?
Now we have a general map, general groups of people, and specific people (NPCs). The next thing I needed was to zone in and become more detailed with my map as we got closer to where the players were based. In my case I followed all my previous steps for map building and still used Inkarnate to get a bit more detailed on a map of their country, adding a few towns for now and some topography. I don’t need to know a bunch about those towns yet. Next, I picked where my players would be based. If this was a city or town, I would then make a detailed map of that as it would be referenced a lot over time. I chose to have a home base outside a town, deep in the woods but there were still multiple buildings, so I mapped that. If your characters have a house or home base you could make a map for that. You could stop at country scale and use theatre of the mind for the rest. Do as much or little as you want. For now, I have not mapped out the inside of shops or their base and instead opted for theatre of the mind, but you never know when that will change.
CONSIDER THAT A WORLD HAS LAYERS AND HISTORY.
This is another one of those steps that is more of a reminder than anything else. To avoid a flat to two-dimensional world, you need to have layers. Here are some things to just keep in the back of your mind and use as you will.
Worlds have long and convoluted histories (unless it is a new world) and usually there are multiple truths depending on the perspective of the teller. Additionally, the average person does not know everything about that history or remember it clearly if they were educated in it.
Everything is connected so think about the butterfly effect and how each decision you make in world building will change something else OR what repercussions there will be for gameplay.
Usually, two of the same things are NOT the same. What I mean by this is that there is always some variation. Unless you are copying and pasting something digitally, there will always be differences and you should play with this. This could be variations between individuals of a race. Or within a pack of wolves where some have different abilities or stats.
So now that I have dumped all of this information on you, I just want to remind you that this was just how I decided to approach it and is way more in depth than some of my friends have done. Some campaigns I have played, they started with just a partial idea of a town and built out from that as we went and another, I have done was a dungeon with a new world on each floor. However, you choose to build your world, I hope this has been at least an inspiration rather than it making it seem more daunting.
